


What Remains

by Mirime



Series: Mirime's Big 3 [1]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Additional Warnings Apply, Changing Tenses, F/M, Prompt Fic, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-13
Updated: 2016-10-13
Packaged: 2018-08-22 05:31:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8274592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mirime/pseuds/Mirime
Summary: A look at Mikasa's relationship with Levi before and after his death.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for my 30th birthday promptathon for [ackerthugs](http://ackerthugs.tumblr.com). The prompt was: _From "once upon a time" to "darkest hour"._
> 
> Italics denote flashbacks. An additional content notice at the end because it's spoilery for the story.

'Levi would hate the long speeches,' Mikasa thinks as she stands at attention with the rest of the squad while yet another high-ranking officer blabbers on and on about the Humanity's Strongest Soldier's sacrifice.

'You barely knew him!' she wants to scream at nearly everyone there. It takes a lot of restraint to keep herself from doing just that but it also helps her to not break down. Sasha and Connie are openly sniffling and even Eren, Jean and Armin wipe at their eyes now and then. She can't see Historia well from where they are standing but if she were to guess, she would say Historia's masking her feelings, too. It doesn't do for the Queen to show too many emotions.

It's not like they didn't know this was going to happen. The mission was never going to succeed without casualties and she knew earlier than most that Levi was the one most likely to die. Both of them knew and both of them made their peace with that.

* * *

_"Someone's going to suspect something if you keep coming here."_

_Mikasa shrugged and sat up in his bed, letting the blanket slide off her bare torso._

_"I'm always careful when sneaking in."_

_Levi sat down in a chair, bending down to take off his shoes._

_"Besides," she said slowly, "I can always say I'm making your last days more pleasant."_

_He snorted at that. It was a morbid kind of humour but it didn't make it any less true. The parameters of their new mission and what it would take to fullfill it were clear to both of them._

_"Robbing me of my sleep every night is supposed to be pleasant?"_

_"You never complained before."_

_"No, I didn't, did I?"_

_He was looking at her now and Mikasa straightened up unconsciously, pushing her shoulders back. His eyes dropped down to her breasts before looking up at her face. She kept her expression open and inviting._

_"We have less than a month to make a life-time of memories," she said. "I don't want to waste a single minute on doubts and regrets. Do you?"_

_He shook his head and finished undressing before joining her in bed._

* * *

The nausea wakes her up and Mikasa barely makes it into the bathroom before she's throwing up the remains of last night's dinner. She remains hunched over, dry heaving but nothing can suppress her feeling of triumph.

"Mikasa?" Sasha calls out from behind the door. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Mikasa calls back and gently presses her hand against her stomach. "I'm fine," she repeats softly. She has been so afraid. It has been more than a month and she wasn't having any symptoms until this morning. It's still too early to tell for sure but Mikasa doesn't allow doubts to intrude on her happiness. She can't allow doubts, not now.

"Do you need me to come in?" Sasha asks.

"That's not necessary," Mikasa replies and climbs to her feet. She tidies up and then she lifts her shirt. Her stomach doesn't look any different but if everything goes as it's supposed to, that's going to change soon. She's looking forward to the change.

Sasha's not in the room when Mikasa leaves the bathroom. Mikasa gets ready for the day, thinking of the best way to approach Commander Hange about a leave. She would prefer keeping as many details as possible to herself but she knows it's not realistic.

Sasha comes back with a cup of ginger tea that she hands wordlessly to Mikasa.

"Thank you?" It's more of a question than an expression of gratitude. Sasha shrugs.

"To help with the sickness. I figured it wouldn't hurt. That's what all women in our village drink when they're pregnant."

Mikasa almost drops the cup.

* * *

_"Why?" Levi asked her shortly before she had to leave to make it back to her room undetected._

_"Why what?" she asked back, her face hidden by the darkness in the room._

_"Why me? Why now?"_

_There was no easy answer to those questions. Half the time, Mikasa wasn't sure herself. The thing she was sure of, though..._

_"It's you because of how you make me feel. As for why now? Because now is the only time we have."_

_He was quiet but his fingers kept stroking the length of her back._

_"And how do I make you feel?"_

_Again, there were so many things she could say in response. Each would be truthful but not complete. There was one thing, though, that was closer to the entire truth than the rest of them. It was a scary answer. It was an answer that was almost too honest, too earnest, too genuine._

_"Weak," she said into the silence of the room. "When I'm with you, I feel weak but at the same time I feel like there's nothing wrong with being weak. Not when you're the only one who sees me."_

* * *

"Why would you think I'm pregnant?"

Mikasa knows how sharp Sasha can be, how intuitive. But she isn't even sure herself, has only hopes and some circumstantial evidence so how can Sasha be so blasé about the whole thing?

"I may be a heavy sleeper but I wake up sometimes in the middle of the night. I know you started sneaking out at night a few months ago."

Mikasa sits down on her freshly made bed and takes a sip of the warm tea. Sasha was right, it is soothing the remains of her nausea.

"That doesn't make me pregnant."

"You're not stupid, Mikasa. You stopped drinking the pine tea about two months ago and that's when you started leaving every night, too. You meant to get pregnant."

"I did," Mikasa admits. She expects Sasha to say something more, berate her for being selfish but she does neither. She just sits down next to Mikasa.

"How do ya feel?" Sasha doesn't seem to notice her accent's slipping and Mikasa doesn't point it out.

"Nervous but also excited. I wanted this to happen and now it did and I know the timing's all wrong but I know I can do this."

"Of course ya can," Sasha says as if there is no doubt about it. "If anyone can raise a kid on their own, it's ya."

On her own, huh? It's easy to forget her reasons for doing this in her excitement but not for long. Mikasa drinks the rest of the tea abruptly and stands up. Sasha looks guilty.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to bring up Captain like that."

Mikasa's not surprised that Sasha guessed even that correctly.

"Don't apologize. I knew from the beginning this was how things were going to be. That's why I did it."

"You wanted-"

"More than a memory," Mikasa says harshly but her anger's not aimed at Sasha. No, her anger is reserved for this cruel world that keeps taking away from her. But this time, this one time, she's the one who's taking away from the world. She deserves that much.

* * *

_"Do you think we would have met if there were no Titans?" she asked him a week before the mission. She was riding him but she was taking her time, gently rocking back and forth._

_"No, we wouldn't," he said and she stopped moving and pinched his side. He didn't even flinch._

_"I think we would," she argued. "We would run into each other at the market. I would bump into you because I couldn't see you down there."_

_She was prepared for his retaliation so she just grinned at him when he reversed their positions and pinned her down._

_"Short jokes again? You're getting predictable, Mikasa."_

_She pulled his head down to kiss him instead of answering. He slid into her and started thrusting and for a while their conversation was carried out only in moans and sighs. Afterwards, she held him close, her hands clasped tightly together around his back, his head resting on her shoulder._

_"You would walk into my shop to get some tea," he said suddenly. "We would get into an argument about which kind was better. I would win, of course."_

_"Of course," she agreed in a mocking tone. He nipped lightly at her shoulder, not hard enough to make a mark but hard enough to be felt._

_"You would keep coming back everyday and I would keep looking forward to those visits."_

_"Until one day I would stop visiting," she said, taking up the story. "After all, you can't visit the place where you live."_

_She felt his breath on her skin when he murmured in agreement._

_"No, you can't."_

* * *

"When are you going to tell others?" Sasha asks.

"Today, after I talk to Commander Hange."

"Do you want me there? For support?"

Mikasa nods. Sasha has always been a good friend and even this situation is not an exception.

"Still, you and the Captain..." Sasha trails off. "It's too bad it ended up like this."

"Yes, it's too bad."

* * *

_Mikasa looked at the tea in front of her. It was a herbal mixture for sexually active female soldiers, designed to prevent pregnancies. She had been drinking it for years, just in case. In recent months, it became a necessity._

_The orders for a new mission came in yesterday. She hated them. Once those orders were carried out, nothing short of a miracle would save his life. She would lose him, for good. He would be gone in a month and all she would have left were few memories._

_Unless..._

_Mikasa looked at the tea in front of her and pushed the cup away._

**Author's Note:**

> Content Notice: pregnancy
> 
> Come find me at my [tumblr](http://mirime-kisarrastine.tumblr.com).


End file.
